Life sucks, and other pithy catch phrases.
8:45 p.m.
Upon joining the bargaining unit, part-time profs started being evaluated by students just as their full-time counterparts had been all along. As seniority points accrue, so do perks, like free tuition and professional development funding. The evaluations are done anonymously, so students have an opportunity to speak their minds without fear of reprisal. However, in a class of 25, a prof is going to know which students badmouth him. The committee that assesses these things expects a few bad ones mixed in with the good, and they’re not taken into account.
Music tutors also started being evaluated, using a modified version of the form already in use for lecture courses. There is a problem. Let’s say you have a course labeled MUS A (we’ll just call it that, all right?) which includes everyone in first year who is studying a musical instrument or singing. There are eight pianists split between two teachers, four singers split between three teachers, one clarinetist, seven jazz guitarists, two classical guitarists, and one cellist. Each one of those teachers is entitled to a seniority point for up to each five students he/she teaches. The clarinet teacher obviously has only one student; she will get one point. The jazz guitar teacher has seven, in which case he will get two points. And so on.
Now, if that clarinet student gives his prof a bad evaluation, the prof is denied a point. What is wrong with this picture? First off, the student is not anonymous, is he? Second, how can you base a teacher’s performance on one evaluation? Hubby tells me that in courses where he has fewer than six students, they just throw the evaluations out. So, why are music tutors being evaluated in this manner?
The course for which I did not receive a point is required by second-year music majors. I only had one student enrolled in that course last year, someone I actually thought liked me. Oh well. The point is, I know who this student is. I am no longer teaching her, so I can’t very well give her a bad mark anymore, not that I would anyway, but I’m in choir with her, I chat with her in the lobby, and now I will look upon her differently than I did the day before yesterday.
I went through this the year before last where I didn’t get a point for the recital course. I had one student enrolled in it. Of course I know who it was. When I read the comments in the evaluation, I could hear this person’s voice, and I knew that it was her problem, not mine; but, nonetheless, I was penalized because she is a whiner.
So, I guess I’d better talk to my union rep and tell him that this system sucks.
Oh, and happy Thanksgiving to my American readers.
<~~~ * ~~~>
